Farragut, TN Outdoor Activities

After paddling his way into the U.S. Olympic Team–trial finals twice, Jeff West, founder of Ace Kayaking School, began sharing his love of the sport with readers of popular publications and more than 5,000 eager students. Striving for a maximum 3:1 instructor to student ratio in all of his courses, Jeff and his team teach key skills to beginners and experienced rollers alike while gliding down the Ocoee River's famous Table Saw rapids. In addition to whitewater kayaking, Ace teaches stand-up paddleboarding and the advanced waterfall navigating techniques of creek boating and freefalling in a barrel.

Foxfire Mountain Adventures introduces guests to the exhilarating heights of Foxfire Mountain with a zip-line course, swinging bridges, and on-ground safari tours. Built in accordance with certified engineers’ ACCT safety standards, the seven-line zip-line course careens through the breathtaking canopy on 60-foot to 1,500-foot lengths at a time. The territory’s swinging bridges sway gently over gorges and waterfalls, each cemented into the mountain and carefully inspected each morning so visitors can appreciate the greenery and the water rushing below in complete safety. For a greater traversal of the park’s 150 acres of wilderness, land dwellers can take a trip in an all-terrain Bear Crawler, an open air vehicle able to scale mountains, cross creeks, and transform into a baby bear to escape detection.

Ocoee Zipz lifts its riders off the ground and transports them to new lands along seven lines named after beloved Wizard of Oz characters and featuring varying grades, distances, and terrain. Staff members, aptly nicknamed The Flying Monkeys of Oz, help adventure seekers soar above Ocoee's 40 acres of rustic scenery during two-hour zipline tours. Tours begin at the 30-foot-high Cowardly Lion launch tower, where fraidy cats find the courage they need to skim the tops of trees. The Dorothy line zooms along the Ocoee River to meet up with the Toto tower across a swinging bridge, where cushy crash pads wait with loving arms to catch especially enthusiastic zippers. Guests may try an upside-down dive off the Scarecrow tower, then test their speed on the Wicked Witch of the West line, which features a steep enough grade to get patrons up to 45 mph. Like Shakespearian arguments or family reunions, Ocoee Zipz's tours end with a duel on The Wizard's parallel lines, as participants race their way to the finish.

Launching into the Ocoee River, Sunburst Adventures' rafts of whitewater adventurers bump and glide over currents with gradients up to 50 feet per mile. An experienced guide mans the helm, offering instruction and zany anecdotes, as rafters navigate past bushes and trees and around three risky undercuts for a challenging, yet safe, excursion. Sunburst's carefully selected team of enthusiastic rafters has been taming the rapids of the Ocoee and sharing their love for the sport and the great outdoors since 1976. Groups of experienced and novice boaters quickly become familiar with a good soaking as they tackle roaring rapids such as Hell's Hole and Godzilla attempting to bend their boats in two as they jostle their way down the river's 10-mile stretch. For a more leisurely way to enjoy the natural splendor and warm waters of the river, aquatic types can tube the Lower Ocoee, which is known for expressing much calmer waters ever since it kicked its pot-of-coffee-a-day habit.

Launched in 2000 as a humble 20'x20' shop, Frontier Firearms has grown into an 11,000-square-foot facility that encompasses two 25-yard, five-bay indoor shooting ranges. Each gallery enhances visitors' comfort with technological touches, such as sound dampening and granulated-rubber-bullet traps that capture rounds mostly intact, thus minimizing particle dispersion into the air. By removing these potential distractions, the ranges let marksmen focus on following the Mancom Touch Plus Active Target Shooting system. Used by law-enforcement agencies such as the FBI, this computerized system can make targets turn, rush toward, and flee from the shooter. Frontier Firearm's team includes instructors who claim NRA and state certifications, which they apply to supervising the ranges and leading handgun classes that range from a ladies-only course to advanced defensive tactics and how to look tough in a saloon.

In addition to cultivating a rich assortment of herbs, Erin's Meadow Herb Farm welcomes visitors into its greenhouses, fields, and classrooms to learn the best uses for its multitudinous varieties of herbs. Inside, visitors can peruse a variety of gifts and products made using all-natural ingredients, or drop in for classes that include demos, spa-centric herbal recipes, and the recipe for creating a love potion disguised as peppermint tea.